1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of decorative jewelry items, and more particularly to the basic structural link element of a jewelry rope chain exhibiting unusual visual properties.
2. Brief Description of the Prior Art
Rope chains are a popular type of jewelry made from linking a number of regular annular links together in a repetitive manner and usually soldering or welding every two links together. The result is a chain that is flexible and pleasing to the eye. The annular links are often formed of gold or other precious metal and are circular in form with flat sides. The circle is not complete as there must be a gap to permit the linking of the links with each other.
Jewelry rope chain has been made for many years. Although rope chains can be made by machine, the better quality rope chains are usually manufactured by hand. While a rope chain has the feel and look of a rope, it is actually made up of a series of individual C-shaped flat link elements made from a precious metal such as silver or gold. The C-shaped link elements are gapped and fastened together in a particular way, such that tightly interlinking annular link elements give the appearance of intertwining helical rope strands. The link elements of hand-made rope chains are made with a tighter fit and are more visually appealing than are machine-made rope chains. A number of annular link elements are connected and intertwined together in a systematic and repetitive pattern of orientation, resulting in an eye-pleasing, flexible, and delicate-appearing chain that looks and feels like a finely braided helix.
In a conventional rope chain, the orientation pattern of individual link elements producing the rope chain is repeated every several link elements, for example every four link elements, and as such is referred to as a four-link rope chain. In an improvement to the conventional basic rope chain, it is taught in U.S. Pat. No. 4,651,517 that the link elements can be constructed in different and narrower dimensions so that the pattern is repeated every six link elements or even every eight link elements. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,301,498, to Chia et al., it is suggested that, by narrowing the cross-section of the link element, the six-link rope chain""s connected segments appear finer than those of the four-link version and consequently provide a more delicate and refined presentation than that obtainable with a four-link rope chain arrangement. While the ""517 patent uses a six-link rope chain as a preferred embodiment, that patent teaches the formulas for creating rope chains consisting of a repeated series of six, eight, or more link elements.
Some manufacturers of jewelry use different colored gold and silver elements to enhance the beauty of the jewelry article. Examples are: rope chains in which sets of link elements of one color alternate with sets of link elements of another color; and bracelets or necklaces constructed of interconnected twisted loops exhibiting alternating colors along their lengths. Gold, for example, is available in at least four colors; white, yellow, rose (pink), and green.
However, in all of the prior art construction techniques for producing rope chain jewelry, each link element is of a single solid color, texture, shape, and pattern, e.g., each link element may be stamped from a solid thin sheet of precious metal, such as gold. Thus, for example, while an all yellow gold rope chain or an all white gold rope chain is attractive, it is otherwise uninteresting due to the monotonic nature of its unvarying coloration and/or texture along the link elements of the chain. Those prior art rope chains that do exhibit variations of colors along their lengths nevertheless are constructed of individual link elements each of which is of a single solid color, texture, shape, and/or pattern.
Other jewelry articles exhibit variations of colors along their lengths using interconnected twisted chain loops, but they are not regarded as rope chains as defined herein.
Moreover, all prior art link elements are generally C-shaped with a constant, typically rectangular cross section. As a result, a predictable visual effect is realized when the C-shaped link elements are assembled to simulate an intertwined rope chain. Additionally, after all of the link elements have been assembled into a finished rope chain jewelry item, a large percentage of the total volume of precious metal in each link element is forever hidden from view. That is, for the structural integrity of the rope chain, certain dimensional parameters have to be maintained, and there have been few attempts in the prior art of manufacturing rope chains to reduce the amount of precious metals being used, for fear of lessening or destroying the structural integrity of the finished product.
One example of prior attempts to reduce the amount of precious metal in a rope chain link element can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,185,995 to Dal Monte. In this patent, it is taught to modify the conventional cross sectional shape of a link element by maintaining a large mass of material at the exterior edge periphery and forming a narrow or pointed interior edge periphery. However, since the cross section for a particular link element is constant throughout the extent of the link element, this severely limits the flexibility of design. For example, manufacturing a link element having different link thicknesses, or different link widths, or different link cross sectional patterns along the extent of the link is not suggested in the ""995 patent, and may not be possible when employing the limited teaching of the ""995 patent.
Furthermore, because of the thin pointed interior edge of a link manufactured to the specifications of the ""995 patent, the interior edges are fragile and can easily be damaged due to the softness of the precious metal (e.g., gold) and due to the abuses that may be inflicted on the rope chain while in use (excessive bending or twisting). Such inadvertent, but normal, usage can compress the width of the links, resulting in a loose interfitting of the links.
Other prior art teaches forming flat surfaces on both sides of a link element to produce a double spiral effect within the already double spiral effect of an otherwise conventional rope chain. Both U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,425,228 and 5,285,625 show flattened sides on the link elements, the latter patent showing the effects of such flattened sides in FIG. 5 thereof. However, neither of these patents teach constructing a rope chain which has two visually different helixes.
The present invention provides the means and method for constructing rope chain link elements in a way to produce a rope chain piece of jewelry in which each link element, or selected link elements, and therefore the rope chain itself, exhibits a unique visual property, e.g., surface texture, coloration, surface reflectivity, pattern feature or characteristic, shape, or other physical appearance attributes. Such unique visual property traits for the succession of link elements results in a more attractive, fanciful, more delicate and interesting fashion jewelry item.
In addition to exhibiting unique visual properties, employing the concepts of the present invention can produce lengths of rope chains in which one of the apparent strands of xe2x80x9cropexe2x80x9d has a different visual appearance than the intertwining xe2x80x9cropexe2x80x9d strand. That is, the appearance of a rope strand at any point along the length of rope chain will be visually different than the adjacent strand. For example, one strand may have an apparent smaller diameter than that of the adjacent strand. Or, the texture, coloration, surface reflectivity, pattern, shape, or other physical attribute of one strand may be totally distinct relative to the adjacent strand.
Additionally, in the process of altering the physical shape of the individual link elements, simultaneously with the enhancement of the visual effect due to the shape altering techniques, small amounts of the precious metal making up the link elements are removed without reducing the effective dimensional characteristics of the elements and, therefore, without diminishing the structural integrity of the finished rope chain product. Moreover, although not intended to be limiting, most of the variations of the present invention maintain a rectangular cross section for all or portions of the link elements. Thus, a distinct and decorative rope chain of a given length may have the identical effective rope diameter as one made with a common C-shaped link of constant cross sectional area, and yet result in substantial manufacturing cost savings due to less material being used in the manufacture of each individual link element, and due to the ability to form the links using inexpensive stamping techniques.
It can therefore be appreciated that creating link elements having variably changing cross sections to provide uniquely shaped building blocks for producing exciting and beautiful visual effects in the construction of rope chains, may simultaneously have the synergistic effect of making such physically altered link elements, and thus the rope chains from which they are made, less expensive.
In accordance with one aspect of the invention, there is provided, in a length of jewelry rope chain of the type comprising a series of tightly interfitting gapped link elements and having the appearance of intertwining helical strands, gapped link elements each having a first major surface, an opposite second major surface, an interior edge, and an exterior edge, the improvement wherein: link width is defined as a distance, measured along either of the major surfaces, between a pair of parallel lines perpendicular to the major surfaces and tangent to, respectively, the interior and exterior edges; and at least some of the link elements in the length of rope chain have an irregular link width.
Preferably, at least some of the link elements in the length of rope chain have a non-symmetrical irregular link width along the extent of the link element.
In another aspect of the invention, each of the link elements that have an irregular link width is divided into segments, each segment possessing a unique link width character relative to an adjacent segment.
One variation of a gapped link element made in accordance with the invention has a smooth interior edge and an irregular, preferably patterned, exterior edge.
An alternative variation has a smooth exterior edge and an irregular, or patterned, interior edge.
In another aspect of the invention, both interior and exterior edges may be irregular or patterned, the exterior edge preferably patterned for an attractive visual effect and to reduce the amount of precious metal, and the interior edge irregular solely to reduce the amount of precious metal needed to form the link element.
In yet another aspect of the invention, rather than having the major, substantially planar, upper and lower surfaces of each link element uniformly smooth, one of the major surfaces, or both such major surfaces, may exhibit perceptively different physical shapes in accordance with a predetermined engraved, etched, diamond cut or other formed pattern arrangement on each major surface. The two major surfaces so configured may be identical on both upper and lower major surfaces, or they may be different one from the other. For example, small portions of each upper major surface may be cut away in a desired pattern, and other portions may be cut away in a second desired pattern. Similarly, small portions of each lower major surface may be cut away in a third desired pattern, and other portions may be cut away in a fourth desired pattern. The designs and arrangement of different patterns may be the same or different on the upper and lower major surfaces.
Instead of, or in addition to, differently shaped major surfaces, the two major surfaces may exhibit differently textured portions, e.g., one portion of a link element may be shiny while another portion may have a sandblasted, frosted, patterned, matte, or diamond cut finish appearance. Also, either major surface may be of a uniform shape and/or texture, while the other major surface is portioned as described.
A further variation has half of the link at a reduced annular width, which reduces material but nonetheless gives the appearance of a rope chain having an effective diameter the same as if the reduced half was of normal annular width.
Instead of reducing the annular width of one half of a gapped link, one half may be enlarged in annular width and provided with openings in the enlarged half. The net amount of precious metal is reduced, as desired, and yet the finished rope chain will have a large diameter and enhanced detail and beauty.
Thus, the interconnecting links may have differently colored, patterned, and/or textured portions, and may have different irregular or patterned shapes or shaped portions. For example, some or all of the link elements making up the rope chain may be partially or wholly smoothly circular with patterned major surfaces, circular with peripheral undulations, circular with peripheral gear-like teeth, circular with diamond cut gouges or notches, may have constantly varying cross sectional portions, may have multiple or relatively large openings therethrough from one major surface to the other, and/or may have an overall configuration that is star shaped, baguette shaped, square shaped, rectangular shaped, oval shaped, diamond shaped, heart shaped, etc. Similarly, different portions of each link element may have such different physical shapes.
A jewelry rope chain link element constructed in accordance with the invention preferably, but not necessarily, may have the shape and configuration of a standard annular link element with at least a portion removed and has a maximum link width equal to that of a similar standard annular link element without any portion removed.
Similarly, a length of rope chain employing link elements as described in the previous paragraph, has an effective maximum diameter equal to that of a similar length of rope chain constructed of solid, standard size annular link elements without any portion removed.
From the viewpoint of a finished length of rope chain, the invention provides an improvement over the prior art, wherein: each link element in the length of rope chain comprises a link portion exhibiting a first visual property, and another link portion exhibiting a second, different, visual property; whereby, when viewed from one side of the length of rope chain, the appearance of one of the helical rope strands is different than the appearance of the other, adjacent, helical rope strand along the length of rope chain.
For example, in one variation, the one helical rope strand is of a predetermined effective diameter, and the adjacent helical rope strand is of a different effective diameter than that of the one rope strand.
In another variation, the one helical rope strand has the shape of a helical cylindrical tube intertwined with the adjacent helical rope strand, and the adjacent helical rope strand has the shape of a helical cylindrical tube with an outer surface portion thereof cutaway along the length of the helical cylindrical tube.
For the latter variation, the outer surface cutaway portion of the adjacent helical rope strand may be formed by a diamond cut process operating on pre-assembled link elements.
As a result of the various combinations possible in the manufacture of jewelry rope chains in accordance with the present invention, a virtually limitless number of different design possibilities exist, and preferred ones of such possibilities are shown and described herein. It is to be understood, however, that all combinations of: the number of interconnected link elements in the repeated pattern along the rope chain; solid or portioned coloration and/or texturing; different designs of the portioned regions of each major surface of the link elements; and different physical shape and/or visual properties as identified in this description may be employed in the manufacture of jewelry rope chains and are contemplated variations of the preferred embodiments specifically shown and described.